Abstract
Diversifying forests and farms can enhance resilience to biotic and abiotic shocks and serve as a climate adaptation strategy; yet, little is known about landowners and farmers’ willingness to adopt it for enhanced resilience. As a case study, we consider the U.S. tree syrup production that currently relies on a single tree species (monoculture) and is vulnerable to climate change. We conducted a choice experiment (CE) with maple producers in the midwestern and northeastern regions of the United States to elicit preferences for diversification adoption, explicitly capturing intertemporal trade-offs between long-term resilience benefits and immediate yield losses. We analyze adoption decisions using logit and hurdle models and apply the latent class model to capture preference heterogeneity across producer groups. Results show a pronounced status quo bias, with most producers reluctant to diversify maple forests. Adoption likelihood decreases with higher diversification intensity, yield reductions, and longer government cost-share contracts, while increasing with higher incentive payments and peer adoption rates. However, providing producers with region-specific projections of syrup production under RCP 8.5 scenarios increases their valuation of resilience benefits and tolerance for short-term opportunity costs. Heterogeneity analysis shows that older, more risk-averse, and timber-oriented producers are less likely to diversify, while those with prior engagement in conservation programs are more open to adoption. These findings highlight the importance of public programs that support diversification investments with flexible contracts, place-based climate information provision, and interventions that take into account producer groups’ diversity.